WSS: A General Smarten-Up (you can't get the staff, you know)

 Last night I did some more work on tidying up my small pool of WSS General Officers, so that I can manage to put on a decent-sized game when required,

These fellows come from various backgrounds - some were specially painted, others are survivors from other people's collections which I bought in, already painted.

Most of them, in fact, were odd officers liberated from Eric Knowles' armies - often Les Higgins generals who were serving as regimental colonels in the cavalry. Some of the charging officers are actually from Higgins's ECW range, but can happily carry on in service - what is 60 years among so many?

 

The coloured mini-dice are also useful for identifying which army a figure belongs to - in many cases, these fellows are up for grabs, and can (and will) serve for anyone who needs them. Paint quality ranges from beautifully professional to, well, pretty industrial. Some of these chaps have obvious affiliations - the guy in the yellow coat, back left, usually defaults to the role of Maffei, because that was the regiment he was liberated from...

I am hoping for a fresh supply of new generals within a few weeks - these chaps will not have cuirasses - my French and British commanders are not allowed cuirasses! In the meantime I spent a little time smartening the bases, touching-up damaged paintwork and so on.

This current collection of leaders is quite an odd bunch, really - few of the uniforms stand up to expert examination - in some ways they feel a bit like the "personality" leaders in Charge and The War Game. I am relying heavily on that well-worn phrase, the senior officers tended to wear what they liked - often civilian garments.

Good enough for me.

WSS: More French Infantry

 Been busy last couple of weeks - keeping my head down to avoid seeing the news. Five new battalions ready for duty. I'm pleased with them. As ever, figures are mostly Les Higgins (small) 20mm from long ago - flags are by David at the excellent Not By Appointment blog, laser-printed to scale by Malcolm at Lothian Printers.

At the front are two battalions of Régiment de Poitou (thank you very much, Lee), in the 2nd row are two battalions of Régiment du Dauphin, and at the rear the single battalion of Régiment de Saintonge.

WSS: Régiment de Champagne

 These are (mostly) very old figures from Eric Knowles' collection, so this has been a return to my Refurb Factory desk. Eric used larger units than I do, so there are some extra command figures added to make up the numbers. I am pleased to say that I am happy with my new technique for painting musicians in the Kings Livery, which has removed an amount of stress from my current push to progress my French contingent.

I have tried to keep the appearance consistent with Eric's original, freshening everything up as necessary, and am pleased with the result. These are the two battalions of the Régiment de Champagne, all ready for the Duty Boxes. The flags are used by kind permission of David at Not by Appointment - no problems this time, with the flags laser-printed on thinner paper.

As always, these are Les Higgins figures - smallish 20mm - though the mounted officers are by Irregular, on Higgins horses.

There will be some more French units arriving over the next few weeks, so the barracks are getting swept out, ready.

Sieges: Getting Organised (a Bit...)

 For a while I've been intending to take advantage of the strange world of Covid limitations and do some solo work on getting the hang of Vauban's Wars. Siege games are, by definition, very dependant on all sorts of fancy scenery and hardware, and it is always very easy to find assorted reasons why this is not the ideal time to have a go. Well, that's long enough.

I now plan to have a solo bash at a Napoleonic siege game, so I'm scratching around trying to collect all the bits and pieces I need. Some of this is trivial work, to be honest, it's just a question of getting down to it.

Today I have a case in point. The starting set-up for my proposed training game requires the British to have a couple of heavy mortars. Now I have odd bits of artillery around the place, and I have some spare soldiers, so it was a simple matter to put together the required mortar battery from some old Hinton Hunt gunners and a couple of very scruffy Hinchliffe mortars I got as a make-weight in an eBay parcel. Here they are - not beautiful, but absolutely fine - cross them off the to-do list. Ready for duty.

There is a new approach evident here - previously I put a lot of effort into making up smart siege trains for the French and the British in the Peninsula. I now also have pieces for a proposed Spanish train, including some fortress guns, and I'm starting to collect items for WSS sieges. My new approach is that I shall paint the ordnance pieces in nondescript colours wherever possible, and make up crews of various nations who can "borrow" spare kit as needed. This is the first such - the scabrous mortars here are simply BluTacked onto the bases, so they can be loaned out to another army, in a different period if required, or they can even be replaced by more beautiful examples if the dreaded Creeping Elegance ever catches up with my siege projects.

Anyway, enough said. I retouched and based these chaps (ex Eric Knowles gunners, by the way) while listening to the Crystal Palace vs Liverpool game on the radio. Easy peasy. The British now have siege cannons, mortars (both heavy and Coehorn), various howitzers and sappers. I even have some new, specially sized and based units of foot, rescued from spares boxes for duty on sieges. And still the wonder grew.

I'll put some notes here on the starting set-up for my Vauban's Wars solo game in a day or two.

WSS: Half a Pint of Cavalry

 "They will say what men say now, Sire: that you have extended the limits of refurbishment."

Almost two years ago, I bought the 20mm part of Eric Knowles' WSS collection, which gave me a flying start into a new project, a new period.

For about 18 months I have been working away to refurbish as much of that collection as made sense; since I had also acquired a veritable mountain of good unpainted castings, and as the number of finished units becomes sufficient to have a game, the pressures have changed. The last refurb job I did (last week) was enjoyable, and I'm pleased with the results, but if I'm honest I have to admit that it might have been easier and probably better to start again with fresh castings.

Also, I have to face up to the fact that under the couch in the attic room I have 3 large boxes of painted candidates for refurbishment, and I haven't really looked at them for about 9 months. Something has changed in the priorities; also, some of these remaining ex-Eric figures are pretty battered, and some of them have uniforms which do not fit with my project. Thus I've decided to draw a line, starting with the cavalry. As from yesterday, I have ice-cream tubs full of Eric's old figures, soaking the old bases off.

 

Massed footbath

I also have some ready de-based figures soaking in the Clean Spirit jar, let's get them back to bare metal and check the castings are nice and clean. Once the ice-cream-tub footbath has done its work, I'll remove the rest of the figures from their bases and put them in the Clean Spirit.

 

Half a pint of cavalry

I have no shortage of soldiers to paint, so there's no point in hanging on to the scruffier end of Eric's painted armies if I'm not going to do anything useful with them.

This also calls to mind the possibility that some of my early restoration work for the WSS was not quite up to the standard I would be aiming for now. That's OK - I'm not worried about that - my earliest refurbs used the very best of Eric's troops, so I'm happy with them.

If I'm going to re-use old figures, let's make it sensible and productive!

WSS: Webb's Foot

 

 

Webb's Foot. Yes, it is a very childish joke, but I've had good mileage out of this one; I've managed to exasperate most of my friends with it over the last week or two, and it's still quacking me up. Oh be still, my aching sides...

The final British battalion for this first phase of my WSS project has now been refurbished and is ready for the Duty Boxes. This has been a rather more challenging refurb job - the figures were from various sources - some were excellently painted, but in a style different from my own, and rather a long time ago; some were fairly roughly painted, and some were unpainted castings drafted in to fill gaps in command and provide grenadiers. Quite a bit of thought went into how to aim for a compromise style which would not clash with the rest of the armies!

Job done, anyway. These gentlemen are Webb's Regt of Foot, also known (for historic reasons) as the Queen's Regt.

A couple of units of Horse are being worked on as I write, and I have to do something about General Officers, and then that's it for now for the Brits. A group photo will be forthcoming, but not for a few weeks, I think. 

WSS: More Brits - The Earl of Orkney's Foot

 Another new unit ready for the Duty Boxes. This one very nicely painted for me by Count Goya, the famous international polymath and part-time owner of warships. This regiment contains a number of pre-owned figures which needed an amount of refurbishment, while the command and the grenadiers are all unused castings which required painting from scratch.

Normally I regard refurb work as the dirty end of my wargame projects, so I do it myself, but Goya is a top-class refurbisher in his own right, and he has done a lovely job here.

These chaps, then, are the Earl of Orkney's Foot, ready for service in 1703-4. As is customary with the British army at this time, one of the problems is who they are and what we might call them. This lot could also be the Royal Regiment, or (informally) they might be referred to as the Royal Scots, but definitely not the 1st Foot until nearly 50 years later (though it probably helps to identify which regiment we are talking about).

So why (I hear you asking, as I did myself) does a Royal regiment not wear dark blue facings, in proper Royal style? It seems that Royal regiments only had blue facings at this time if they were part of the English establishment, and in 1703 these fellows were definitely Scottish, so blue facings were not a consideration until after the Act of Union in 1707.

That's quite enough about that. 

The weather was better today, though we did go through a brief charade here during which the sun went behind a cloud each time I emerged from my front door. That's not a problem - I simply sighed patiently, and waited for it to come out again. You have to demonstrate that you are not distressed, and the weather gets bored quickly.

Figures, as ever, are Les Higgins 20mm, and the mounted officer (though not his horse) is from Irregular.

WSS: Some New Brits

 Four new units based and flagged yesterday.

First of all, some lovely paintwork by Lee; I am very pleased to welcome these two units:

 

1st Foot Guards

 

Schomberg's Horse

At a much more mundane standard, there are two refurbished units of my own:

Royal Regt of Ireland (Hamilton's Foot)

 

The Buffs (Charles Churchill's Foot)

It is a gloomy sort of day today. Too damp to go outside, and the light in the attic isn't really adequate for indoor shots. I tried a few flash photos, but the gloss varnish makes it hard to get any sense out of these. I am reminded that a light box is one of the numerous projects with which I have made no progress this year!

As always, the figures are mostly Les Higgins/PMD. The mounted command figures are Irregular, but the remainder, and all the horses, are Higgins. More British troops in the pipeline, so I'll make an attempt at a decent group photo when they arrive. The lighting people have been warned.

WSS - The Attic Room

 After a few months off, to leave space for some heavy Real Life stuff and also to avoid some oppressive heat up there, I've got back to some soldier painting in the Attic Room.

 

Up in the roof - very quiet up here, except when it's stormy. Tea and biscuits and I'm up for it.

I'm working pretty slowly, restricting myself to sessions of about two and a half hours, but it's pleasing to be back at it. I'm sort of getting myself comfortable with what I hope will be a useful Winter of hobby work. I'm attempting to establish some kind of default routine, so that it feels as though I know what I'm doing!

 

Lots of bright lights, and during daylight hours I keep the blind shut for painting, since my poor old eyes don't like overhead light.

Some suitable radio programme on in the background (if there's no football on it's usually BBC Radio 3 these days, not least because they have minimal news coverage, and I may now have retired from listening to the news...), a flask of black tea and some Abernethy or Digestive biscuits and I'm very peaceful up there!

I have some excellent painting work going on elsewhere, contracted out to guys who paint much better than I do, which will appear here before long, but I've resumed some of my ongoing WSS refurb work. As ever, this refurb stuff is an industry with traditions all of its own. The original figures are never as good as I thought they were, I spend a lot of time fiddling around improving things that I had planned to leave alone, I keep being reminded that these are never going to look as good or as crisp as work on fresh castings would, but they will be fine when they are finished!

 

Not yet ready to be looked at - I'm currently half-way through the belting and leatherwork; these chaps will take a big step forward when they get their hats painted!

I'm currently working on a batch of pre-owned figures I bought from the Rye Soldier Shop before it was closed by Covid; the figures on the bottletops at present will, by the weekend, be The Buffs (Holland Regiment, Charles Churchill's Foot, whatever) and the [Royal] Irish Regt (Fred Hamilton's Foot). After that I have some more refurb work to do on some rather better figures, these acquired from the legendary Albannach last year - I am still pondering who they'll be after a wash and brush-up.

British army is shaping up - still some more Horse required, and I'm short of a couple of guns and most of the Staff, but definitely getting there. Next after that will be a belated assault on the French - there are hordes of them waiting to be painted! After that there should be some Dutch, the odd German principality and what not. However, at the moment, my immediate objective is to get settled into my Winter studio, and get used once again to painting regularly and in sensible amounts. Looking forward to it, actually.

The Armourer Visits - another stream of consciousness...

 I was sorting out The Cupboard the other day, to get the French soldiers into a logical order (which helps a lot with setting up and putting away - any Chief of Staff will tell you), and to make space for new and impending arrivals. While thus employed, I removed a couple of small trays of odd bits and pieces which some untidy beggar seems to have left in there, and I found a little stand of Spanish guerrilleros, which has been in there since September 2018 (I checked), waiting for me to repair a sword that I broke.

I have to say at this point that breakages here are very few and far between - probably because I am extremely timid about roughing up my troops (a legacy of being the owner of delicate Les Higgins figures for so many decades), and they spend their lives glued onto MDF bases, which are magnetised and mounted on permanently allocated sabots; I don't remove casualties and the armies spend their off-table time locked in The Cupboard or in specially-prepared A4 box files. [I think I was severely traumatised at the beginnings of my wargaming career, when at my local club it was considered macho behaviour to shove handfuls of figures around in heaps - fortunately they were mostly S-Range Minifigs, as I recall, which can stand a great deal of rough handling.]

 

The repaired sword - Alfonso is as pleased as anything. His neighbours, I think, are SHQ - there are also Falcata figures among the partida bands. Qualiticast alloy does not bend, I learned.

 Anyway, I had a breakage in 2018, and I remember doing it, and I've been wondering ever since what is the best means of repair, since this is not a strong part of my act. The basic problem is that the broken figure was a Qualiticast casting; they always seem to have used a hard, brittle alloy. Normally they do not break, but I caught a sword with my finger when I was tidying away one evening, and it just snapped off. Didn't bend, just went "ping" and snapped off, about 2mm from the hilt. [Before everyone rushes to tell me how I should fix it, thank you, but please read on...]

I eventually developed a plan for fixing it after reading an article from Archaeology Today about Bronze Age weapons someone had dug up. Glossing over the fact that Archaeology Today seems a strange title to me, what struck me was that these bronze swords were cast with a tang (aha!), a pointy bit which was fixed into the handle. That could be the correct approach for repair of a White Metal Age Qualiticast sword, I decided, though of course it took me a couple of years to get around to it.

Anyway, that's what I did. I filed the broken stub of blade off the hilt, drilled a hole (rather bravely, I thought) in the hilt, heading up into the chap's wrist, and spent a while filing the broken end of the blade into a short tang, as described, such as would fit into the hole. Some superglue, then an extra couple of thin coats of superglue to build it up a bit, paint and varnish and you're done - next gentleman, please. I shall look after it, of course, but you can't really tell it was broken. Good. Result. 

I remembered that the game when Alfonso got his sword broken was a demonstration for the benefit of my aunt (no, really), and was one of two pre-production runs-out for what became the Ramekin mod I use with Command & Colors. Ramekin started life as a simplification of C&C, for the benefit of novice generals. It became rather awkwardly obvious that the simplified game, for a large battle, ran a lot faster and was at least as much fun as the official rules. And the rest, as they almost say, would be history if only anyone knew about it and was interested.

I also remembered that this Battle of Alfonso's Sword was a fictitious game which I've always intended to revisit, so that may be coming up shortly. Watch this space.

Some Figure Paleontology - Back in the Old Boxes...

 On the phone yesterday with Stryker, the topic of vintage Hinton Hunts came up, as it tends to. In particular, I was interested in the Hinton Hunt French Napoleonic Grenadier à Cheval, which was made in 2-piece and OPC forms. I was vaguely aware (that's "vague" by normal standards, not necessarily mine) that I have a decrepit unit of ex-Eric Knowles OPC Gr-à-Ch in one of the Old Boxes, so I determined to have a dig in there and see what I actually have. Knowledge is power.

I was pretty sure that my unit was mixed - I thought that most of them are Alberkens - or 20mm Minifigs of some sort (I'm not good at distinguishing between these - I have always sort of assumed that the ones which look a bit like Hintons are Alberkens, and that the ones which don't aren't). I also knew that some of them were different, and assumed that they must be Hintons.

Having got my coffee level to the required threshold, I tied a rope around my waist, donned my head torch and set off on my adventure. Box "J" is the one containing ex-Eric French cavalry - I tell you so that you may remind me next time I do this. In there I was surprised to find that my Gr-à-Ch are not Hinton Hunts at all, but are all what I had assumed to be Alberkens (I would welcome any more definite identification). They come in two varieties, as I shall attempt to show. I gave them a good wash, and attempted some photos.

 

Here, on the left, is a single example of the original figure, with two examples of the modified one. Someone, as you will see, has had a serious go at the modifications - replacement sword blade and scabbard, an added musket and a superior paint job. Definitely the same horse, though.

 

From the front, the difference is surprising - the figures on the right are much wider, have a sword arm which is away from the body and are much more detailed. Hmmm.

I've now checked a couple of places online, and it seems that the Alberken OPC Gr-à-Ch was a pretty close copy of the HH model, which these patently are not. Maybe Minifigs produced a separate design? Maybe these are something else altogether? I am interested by the very different stature, the replacement sword-blade, stuck-on musket and (I think) scabbard. Has someone just smartened these up, or am I looking at two different generations of the same figure? Interesting. The horse, which is definitely not an HH clone, has an unusual configuration - the hindquarters are a bit low-slung (short back legs - what my Grandma used to call "Ducks' Disease") and I am not at all convinced about my previous assumptions about Alberken/Minifigs.

I am happy to accept that I'm probably not going to be able to do much with these, but would like to know what they are, and who is likely to have done the modifications. Just out of interest, like.

Speaking of ex-Eric soldiers, I have now washed and cleaned up the next "cannonfodder" refurb batch, being Hinton Hunt French line infantry from exactly that source. They are now on bottletops, and in project boxes, ready for work, but I shall not start them immediately. I intend to get to them before four years, however.

Slow and Steady Does It

 I have a number of refurb jobs on the go at the moment - quite a lot of them, in fact - and I find it satisfying when I complete one, but increasingly I find that the unfinished ones nag at me. It's not that I was better organised when I was younger, it's just that I seem to worry about it more now. Perhaps I have less confidence in there being plenty of time? - Let's not go there.

I'm spending a few weeks - during the start of the Spring temperate painting season - clearing off some of the Napoleonic backlog, to clear the mind and free up some boxes for re-use. One of these has been on the go for about 4 years - a pile of old, rather bashed figures I got very cheaply from the worthy Steve Cooney, which I lined up for one of my "cannonfodder" projects. This is not intended as any kind of a poke at Steve, I hasten to add - I knew exactly what I was getting into when I took them on! This batch consisted of old Der Kriegsspieler castings, and - Steve being Steve - he had taken his soldering iron to bayonets, gaiters, bases...

 

Five additional battalions; the rank and file are mostly tweaked Der Kriegsspielers, from many years ago. There are SHQ, Hinton Hunt and Schilling among the command figures. I was short of grenadiers, so recruited some Alberken Old Guard to make up the numbers - I had some misgivings about these, since the castings are relatively crude, but they came out all right, I think!

These chaps are never going to win any prizes for beauty, and have actually been quite a lot of work to paint up, but in the end they are pretty much what I was aiming for - hoping for the old Featherstone objective of "looking good in the mass".

During the intervening 4 years, I have had an occasional peep at their current state, noted that the Refurb Fairies had once again failed to come to help out, and I had rather quailed at the prospect of resuming work on them, but this has all been cowardice. Since I set my mind to finishing them, I've rather enjoyed the painting sessions, though I've listened to an awful lot of BBC Radio 3 and drunk a lot of black tea in the process.

So I have added 2 battalions of the 65e Ligne and 3 battalions of the 22e to Brennier's (Sixth) Divn of the Armée de Portugal, circa 1812. I already have one battalion of the 17e Léger and a solitary battalion of the Regiment de Prusse, so I only need the missing light battalion, a couple of groups of combined voltigeurs and some staff, and I need to allocate one of the spare foot artillery batteries to them, and the Division is done.

In the unlikely circumstance of anyone being interested, I must explain [to myself, really], that it has taken me about 3 months to break my new house rule of no 3rd battalions. The 22e really do need a 3rd battalion, or their brigade will be a runt. I have, however, stuck to my existing rule that 3rd battalions don't get flags [that'll teach them].

Finishing little projects is good - even sub-projects. Must nurture my enthusiasm... 

Thanks to Steve for supplying the figures back in 2017 - worked out fine, and his boys will fight on.

 

WSS: More British Foot Completed

 After a day's delay, occasioned by my deciding I really had to produce my own version of the flag for North & Grey's Regiment, the three new units are now ready for war. This is all Blenheim period...

 

On what looks rather like Joe Morschauser's breakfast table, here is the regiment of Baron North & Grey (surely one of the sillier titles?), also known as the Earl of Bath's Regt. I refuse to discuss these chaps in terms of regimental numbers which weren't thought of for another 50 years (although it seems everyone does...). The flags were quite a lot of work, but worth it.

 

This is the Duke of Marlborough's Regt (aka Edward Dering's)

 

And this is Scrope Howe's Regt (aka Sir Wm Clifton's). Scrope Howe not one of the great names, either, really

Since it seemed a pity to miss out on the opportunity, I fetched Ferguson's Regt out of the Really Useful Boxes, and lined up a group photo of what could be my first British brigade - if they only had a general...

It's OK - all in the pipeline. I'm waiting for cavalry figures and guns to arrive in the mail, and I have the next couple of battalions ready to go on the bottletops. Coming along nicely.

***** Late Edit *****

I've been using flags from Warflag and the War Office for my WSS armies, though I had to put in some original effort for my Imperial troops. For the French, my intention is to use Warflag, and I'll maybe dust off my blog note on texturing using Photoshop. There are also some lovely flags on the Not By Appointment blog, of course, (though they tend to be more towards the SYW) and I always keep an eye on Ray's smashing work on Don't Throw a 1 (though his are usually a bit earlier than the WSS).

Since I couldn't find flags for North & Grey's regiment with high enough resolution in a decent size, I had a go myself. If you're not offended by the stock clip-art "Sun in His Splendour", I thought they might be useful for anyone else who, like me, couldn't get hold of the appropriate Robert Hall sheet(!).

I might texture them, in fact, if I get into texturing the French ones, but for the moment I'm pleased enough with this - at 20mm scale, the textured flags sometimes look as though someone dropped them in the dirt!

******************

WSS: The Refurb Factory Chugs On, plus a "Missing Link"

 I'm currently working on a British contingent for my WSS collection - I've been lucky enough to get some figures painted by Goya, but at a more humble level I've been working on refurbing some bought-in troops - these are variously sourced from eBay, from the old Rye Soldier Shop and from that all-round Good Egg, Albannach. The ex-Eric Knowles collection I bought in 2019 did not include much in the way of British troops, since the British were one of the nations which Eric had been in the process of replacing with Hinchliffe.

Anyway, today I've varnished a batch of refurbed musketeers, these are for the regiments of Wm Clifton, Dering and the Earl of Bath, and the grenadiers and the rest of the command, to complete the battalions, will be painted from scratch, from fresh figures. Using this procedure, I also plan to add the Royal Irish and the Buffs, plus (probably) two battalions of the Royal Scots, and I will source the Foot Guards from fresh figures. Still a load of cavalry and artillery needed, but this is shaping up.

The musketeers here are the Les Higgins MP15 "at ease" pose, and the officer is one of the castings from the MP19 pack. With an unusually seamless glide, I shall now move onto my second topic, which is all about this very MP19 pose...

 Collectors of old figures invariably become nerdy about the history of the poses, and the changes and variants (is it all right to say that?) which appeared over the years of production. I am getting into this situation with the Les Higgins/Phoenix Model Developments Marlburians, which I had hardly seen 18 months ago, so nerdism obviously sets in quickly. There are a number of figures in the range which were replaced after the changeover to PMD (early 1970s) - a couple of poses which were standing on one leg (and therefore fragile) were modified, and the drummer figure was completely replaced by a new one, sculpted by Tim Richards (who became chief designer after Les Higgins' death), as was the advancing/charging musketeer (MP16?).

One of the figures which was modified is the charging officer from the MP19 pack (as mentioned above). It was never one of Les's best, to be honest, and at some point it was improved. I have specimens of the original and the improved production castings...

Here you see, from left to right, original (front), improved (front), original (rear) and improved (rear) - you can see that the wig and the ornamentation on his coat have been modified, and his coat has been restyled at the back so that it now drapes over his sword scabbard. OK - that's a nice example of an upgrade, and it probably dates from when the Higgins ranges were re-branded as PMD (with changed logos on the bases).

However, in this particular case I happen to have in my possession the actual altered master figure, with added sculpting in beeswax and Plasticine (or something), which came with an assortment of oddments from Tim Richards' old desk drawer in the old PMD factory at Earls Barton - here it is - the Missing Link - the step between the original and the revised production charging officer in MP19. You can see quite clearly what Tim has done. Notice that the face is still Les' original sculpt, but that the shape of the back of the hat has been tweaked.

 

That's probably enough of that - I've put him back in the official Nerd's Drawer - Box B...

WSS: Quick, Snappy Parade

You want it good, or you want it Thursday?

[Nelson Riddle]

 

I was sorting out some flags and putting the finished boys in a better order in the boxes. Since I am now about a year into this project, I thought some commemorative photos would be appropriate. Time is a bit short this morning, since I have to go to get my car fixed, so there will some grumbling in the ranks about order of precedence and all that, but here are my Austrian and Bavarian armies for circa 1703, in their current state.

The Austrians - they are due to get a proper command stand for the C-in-C, and there are two battalions in mid-refurb, otherwise we are just about there.

The Bavarians - nothing in the to-do list for these chaps, so I guess they are done for Phase 1

Next up? - well I'm keen to get some siege and fortress artillery done, so they can join in with Vauban's Wars, and (to be strictly honest) the Austrians and Bavarians could each use an extra regiment of horse, and after that I have a lot of French and British troops to sort out. Team photos are reassuring - it reminds me that a lot has been done! Many thanks to Goya for help with infantry painting.

No social distancing in 1703.

Wet Day - Keeping Busy...

Very nice, sunny morning first thing, but it gradually clouded over and from early afternoon we've had what one might describe as biblical rain. At one point I had to get the recycling out to the bin, and I stood in the downpour to watch what looked like a shallow river running down the lane outside our gate. Yes, I got a bit damp, but it was worth it - not much happens around here.

Among the boxes of soldiers from the Eric Knowles collection which I have here, waiting for refurbishment, there are some generals and staff figures. A lot of these are very early Hinton Hunts, and the quality of the castings is a revelation to those of us who first met up with HH in the 1970s. I've done very little with these fellows thus far, so I decided to have a go at one. The original painting was of a very nice quality, but, being singly-based commanders, they have been subjected to a lot of handling, so the paint is worn in places, and the colours have (obviously) faded during the last 50-odd years.

So here is my new General Lord Somerset (though he could be almost anyone), a vintage Hinton Hunt BN107 OPC figure, freshly retouched and based, fronting his (ex-Eric) Household Brigade, ready for Waterloo if required.

I also glued up some of these. This is the production run of the Max Foy Mark 2 Siege Doofer (Vauban version) - Michael of Supreme Littleness did a nice job on these. I shall slap some paint on them sometime this week. All taking shape on the siege front - I'm waiting for the postie to bring me my latest shipment of trenches (they're in transit from Fat Frank's emporium).

This evening I'm listening to the Burnley vs Spurs match on Radio 5 Live, while working to set up a battlefield for Thursday. Still some work to do, but a decent start. You may hear more of this. Note the bag of Orange Chocolate Minis, courtesy of Terry's Chocolate - other sweets are available, of course, but these are the official confectionery of choice of Foy's Battlefield Construction plc.  

Now you're talking - these bags are now resealable, so you can have one or two minis and put them away for later. Can't understand that at all - surely they would go stale? Certainly I can't remember ever having a bag which lasted into a second day. Still, it's an interesting development.

WSS - King Louis' Footbath

Time to get back to the WSS refurb work, so I'm starting with some easy stuff - let's soak the old bases off some ex-Eric Knowles French infantry, and clean them up, ready for retouching. In fact these guys look pretty good - there are a few bent muskets to sort out (and associated flaked paint) but by and large these look mostly like a wash and varnish job. [If I had a pound for every time I've thought this, I would have - ooh - several pounds, I would think]

First WSS job in the queue, strictly speaking, is an Austrian regiment, IR Haßlingen (2 battalions), which is hanging over from Phase 1, so I'll get started with them. These French chaps, once I have counted them and sorted out what's what, can get boxed up as potential battalions, then the next footbath load will be some more French, from elsewhere. After that I'm looking at British and Dutch, and goodness knows where we get to from there, but first off I need to work out a supply of cavalry - I have a load of cavalry figures, but they are all strip-and-start-again stuff. There will be a shortage of vintage figures for cavalry and artillery, so I'll also check out what I need to get in from Irregular. I'm also thinking seriously of having two standards per battalion for both French and British, just for the look of the thing, so I'll have a look at that. I also rather fancy getting some mounted officers from Irregular to provide French colonels, since the no-cuirass look is better for them

So - one step at a time - these French chappies can be soaking for a few days while I get set up to paint Haßlingen. Once they are clean and I have played around at organising them into units I can decide what else I need to get in. Busy busy. Idle hands are the Devil's fake news.


Footnote: today I have switched back to the "legacy" version of Blogger, since the new one will not allow me to set up a new post. The new one also will not let me collect a folder of images, to be inserted one at a time as I require them. With New Blogger, as far as I can see, you have to upload your images as you need them - if you don't insert them immediately, in a single lot, you will lose the folder and have to upload them again. Oh well. The new version has been going fairly well, and offers some facilities the old one didn't have - no doubt I'll like it again in a week or two, but at the moment it is a pain in the erse.

Napoleonic Refurb Work - British Dragoons

It's been rather hot in the attic this week for extended painting sessions, but I've finally finished the refurb work on some ex-Eric Knowles British Dragoons. These are Hinton Hunts of great vintage, having been present at the 1965 Waterloo Anniversary game at the Duke of York's Headquarters. Accordingly, out of respect, my efforts have been directed at restoring the faded and worn sections of Eric's original paintwork rather than blitzing it and starting afresh [I understand that maintenance work on the Mona Lisa, for example, is approached in the same way!].

All based, with gaps left for the command figures

One consequence of this is that it has been quite a lot of work to get the figures to a state which I would describe as "good but not perfect" [which is probably how the job reports on the Mona Lisa read, too].

A few nights ago, at about 1am, I found myself working away, smartening up the piping on Eric's original turnbacks (in 20mm), and I was laughing to myself, wondering how I had managed to get here. Some of the original paint has also roughened a bit over the years, which makes it something of a challenge to get horse harnesses and so on to brush on smoothly over the top, but I got there.

Anyway, having reminded myself that Napoleonic uniforms are more labour-intensive than the WSS, I am now left with the job of adding some converted command figures to complete the two units, which are to be the 1st and 3rd Dragoons. I don't propose to start hacking up 50-year-old Hintons for spare parts, so the trumpeters and officers will be SHQ/Kennington figures, mounted on Hinton Hunt horses. Shouldn't take too long.

Tubs and Jars and Boxes

Today is my last chance to cut the lawns before the gardener comes tomorrow - it's raining. You may wonder why there is some pressure to get this job done if the gardener is coming. Partly this is a matter of self-respect, if I don't do the lawns between his visits, there is just a whiff of smug contempt when he comes; more seriously, I begrudge paying him for time spent doing a job I could (should) have done myself - there is no way I am about to climb up the big hedge with a ladder and a petrol trimmer - that's what I want to be paying him for!

So this morning I am doing a little tidying around the house. I thought I might take some pictures of the various hobby jobs I have around the place this week. The pervading theme seems to be one of storage, but it was ever thus, I guess.

Dragoons in the bath - these should be a very easy refurb job - 1st & 3rd British Dragoons soaking in a very mild detergent wash, to clean off half a century of muck and the remains of the cardboard bases. I'll get them retouched and varnished, and mount them on their new MDF bases, leaving gaps...

...for their officers and trumpeters, who will need a little more work!

Meanwhile, I have been doing some more editing and testing of my (slowly) evolving WSS rules, which are really shaping up nicely. The last big job will be to produce an intelligible leaflet and a decent QRS. You may observe a rather flexible approach to a hex gridded battlefield.

Whiteboards are very useful chaps - this is version 23.5 of the Firing Rules, which is pretty stable now - we are getting somewhere when there are no swear-words in the draft!

War in a Box - this is the current state of the WSS armies, and - yes - the bases are magnetised, and the Really Useful Boxes are lined with Ferro Sheet (the stuff which replaced Steel Paper).

Look, there are soldiers in there!

A jar of Imperialists - there is a delay with the Regt Hasslingen - about 16 or 17 of their number are pickling in the stripper jar; this is Clean Spirit (not so clean), and the fellow at the front looks just about ready for the toothbrush.

This is the next big job on the Refurb front - 3 battalions of French Napoleonic light infantry. I'm not going to start this for a week or two - I have to prepare for a Zoom battle, scheduled for Friday, anyway. You will observe that there are some bare-metal boys in there, and there's a full house of bayonets. Rank and file are 1970s Les Higgins, the command figures are already painted, and mounted on the bases, waiting. Command are a mix of SHQ and Higgins - the eagle bearers are plastic - nothing else available in this scale at present - but their flagpoles are brass, which is a relief all round.

Conversions - Some British Dragoon Command Figures

I need to improvise some command figures to complement some Hinton Hunt OPC British Dragoons I am in the process of refurbishing - Waterloo period uniform. I've considered various alternatives, but this afternoon's effort looks promising. This is an SHQ-Kennington trumpeter mounted on an HH horse.

He must have had a rather uncomfortable time being adjusted to fit his new horse, but it took a lot less work than I anticipated. Here he is pictured with one of the HH troopers - good for scale and general appearance, I think. I have a slight concern that the "shaving brush" at the front of the helmet is a bit puny by HH standards, but I think some fusewire and a little acrylic putty will put that right - a simple enough job - and I'll try to patch up that trumpet a bit while I'm at it.

Officers and another trumpeter to follow, then a group paint job - could be another low-effort refurb job (with luck!).